


An Analysis of the Ability to Travel in Time Without Technological Assistance

by Bluebox42



Category: Doctor Who, Undertale (Video Game)
Genre: Determination (Undertale), Determination Experiments (Undertale), Headcanon, No Plot/Plotless, Spoilers - Undertale Pacifist Route
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2021-02-11
Updated: 2021-02-11
Packaged: 2021-03-17 05:28:05
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 4
Words: 2,710
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29345124
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Bluebox42/pseuds/Bluebox42
Summary: My headcanon about determination, how it works, and how it plays with time travel. The Author of the paper is a character from Doctor Who (tell me if you figure out who), and the time travel stuff is written based on Doctor Who time travel. Feel free to use this, critique it, or whatever. This is my first work so any advice you have on my writing style I'd really appreciate. Also feel free to ask me anything!





	1. Table of Contents and Introduction

Table of Contents:

1\. Introduction  
2\. The Three Requirements for Determination  
3\. The Mechanism of Determination  
4\. Determination and Time Travel  
5\. Personality Traits  
6\. Side Effects  
a. The Chara Effect  
b. Pheidippides Syndrome

Introduction:

The technology needed to travel through time is known only to a few species, and takes millennia to master. But some individuals don’t need to bother with the technology. Instead, they are able to manipulate time paradox-free and completely unaided by a purely mental form of time travel. Most of the individuals with this ability describe it as sending their mind back in time (Loading), to a point they have set earlier in their time stream (Saving). Despite the short temporal range of this ability, and the lack of a linked spatial transport, this form of time travel has a key advantage.  
The normal limit for the number of times a time traveler can be in the same time and place is one, or two if the time traveler is either exceedingly careful or incredibly careless. But for these individuals, they could theoretically be in the same place an unlimited number of times (though in practice repeated jumps have a deleterious effect, this will be covered in a later section).  
The effect on the Time Vortex is similar to a black hole, as it bends and changes course to accommodate these individuals. Before it was known that these disturbances were caused by individuals, they were known as “temporal riptides”, because crossing the effect within the Time Vortex will cause you to be dragged to the end of their time loops. Now that we know specific people are responsible, they are sometimes referred to by the name of the phenomenon they cause. The ability remains unnamed. Unfortunately, the name “Vortex Manipulator” has been taken by an inferior form of time travel. After studying these people throughout time I have an alternative name for the ability: Determination. Throughout history and the multiverse, these people have many names for their ability, but this comes closest to capturing the core of it.  
For some reason humans make up the vast majority of cases in the multiverse, though even among them the odds of even one person with determination existing is small until they establish populations on multiple planets. However, as the human population grows, so do the odds of someone manifesting Determination at any one time. Even more worrisome is the probability of multiple people with Determination existing at once. Therefore, the study of Determination is crucial.  
Throughout this paper, people who have the ability to Save and Load are referred to as people with Determination. Unless otherwise noted, people with Determination refers to those who have manifested their ability. When referring to the power, I will capitalise it (Determination, Save, and Load) for clarity.


	2. The Three Requirements for Determination

Determination is composed of three parts: the chemical, the personality, and a catalyst (to activate the power). Saving and Loading is impossible without all three.  
The most immediate indicator is their stubbornness. Determination can only be controlled by an incredibly stubborn individual, as Loading is essentially punching a hole in time through force of will. This stubbornness is the defining trait of people with determination, affecting every aspect of their personality. In addition, once they gain the ability to manipulate time, people with this personality profile become even more stubborn, while those without this ability will have to control their stubbornness in order to function. With a little practice, even someone who cannot sense the temporal nature of these individuals should be able to recognize them by this trait alone.  
In addition to being stubborn, you need extremely high quantities of the substance that provides the mechanism for saving and loading, which I will also call determination, as that is what the scientist who discovered it named it. This is most likely produced either in addition to, or instead of, adrenaline in humans, given the instances that often trigger saving. Most humans have trace amounts of determination in their bloodstream, though nowhere near the concentration required to perform a Save or Load. This may be the reason humans make the majority of people with Determination. Determination can have a corrosive effect, but this only poses a serious threat to the individual when in extremely high quantities, although a creature that is very delicate or has extremely low density could suffer damage. Although determination is not strong enough to deal substantial damage to creatures, it does interfere with delicate instruments, for example if left in a cuvette too long it will damage the interior and make obtaining results difficult. It is also rather unstable, the protein takes several very different conformations, and I haven't pinned down the conformation with unusual temporal qualities. This makes determination difficult to analyze.  
In one case, the addition of determination to a plant was enough to give it the ability to move, give it sentience, and even, according to a child with Determination, give the plant Determination as well. I haven’t been able to recreate this event, and as of yet I do not have enough data to safely inject any subject with large quantities of determination. However, the role of determination in inducing these abilities must be fully investigated, if for no other reason than to understand the origins of this ability.  
Excluding the flower, even if someone has the potential to become an individual with Determination, their powers will remain latent unless activated by an event. I call this event a catalyst. This event is often be a direct threat to themselves or their loved ones, but not always. Normally this event is a fixed point in time even before the person with Determination reaches it. The catalyst appears to be an event that sets them on the path to future Save points, and the person with Determination does not have as much control over the catalyst as they do over other Save points. This point becomes the first save point, there is no verified instance of a successful Save before the catalyst, though it is not clear whether this is due to a genuine inability, or them being unaware of their power. In addition to being the first Save point, it is completely static. It cannot get Saved over, barring another circumstance that fulfills the role of a catalyst. The catalyst Save point is rarely used, fortunately for the stability of the Time Vortex. People with Determination seem to dislike making time loops that are too large, describing them as “maddening”.  
One final note: only one person can Load at a time (although any determined person can Save) this suggests people with Determination exert control over the entire timeline, not just their personal one. One person with determination is rare enough to be considered anomalous, in my travels I have only found one instance of two people with Determination existing in the same place and time, that of the flower and the child. As a result, I am unable to determine what factors lead to control of the Time Vortex, at least until I find another such confluence. However, this case did reveal some interesting data.  
Firstly, even if they can’t Load, people with Determination can still remember events that occurred before a Load. Secondly, the presence of two people with Determination results in a much larger disturbance in the Time Vortex. This should make detection easier, though any up-close analysis will be far more hazardous. Thirdly, and finally, what data I could collect from analysis after the fact indicates that two people with Determination are drawn to each other. In the case I examined this preceded a mainly adversarial relationship, causing a massive strain in the space-time continuum, and a battle that took place through dozens of time loops. I don’t know if an adversarial relationship is an inherent part of their competition for control of the timeline, or if cooperation is possible. The advantages of cooperation, if any, remain to be seen.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> So the catalyst is normally the start of the video game. My alternative headcanon is that it just had to be an incredibly stressful event, for example in Undertale it'd be that point where Frisk realized they were falling into the mountain. This version is less "trauma activated superpower" and is more timey-wimey. Also I changed a bit about the instability of determination, cause in the intervening years I took biochemistry courses and the new version is at least more plausible.
> 
> Dr. Alphys wasn't looking for the key to time travel when looking at Determination, so her research is mainly tangential to the Author's.


	3. The Mechanism Behind Determination: Saving and Loading

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The Saving and Loading present in Undertale are different from normal video game saving and loading, but the two aren't completely incompatible.

Saving and Loading are the primary characteristics of Determination, and they are the mechanism behind the time travel. The Save sets a point in time the person can return to via Loading. This form of time travel is one way, a person with Determination can only go back in time.  
The act of Saving involves the same basic mechanism across individuals, although the exact sensation varies from person to person, and even from Save to Save. The most common descriptions are: taking a ‘mental photograph’, taking a moment to gather their nerves, and finding joy or hope. Saving involves a spike in determination, and a significant increase in activity in parts of the brain associated with visual perception and memory.  
Overall, the actual act of Saving is instantaneous, though it may take time to gain the concentration required to Save, particularly if the individual is not directly in danger. People with Determination say that the process of Saving makes time stand still. There is a minor disturbance in the Time Vortex when a Save is created, even without the presence of a Load, which seems to corroborate this information.  
A Save point is embedded in the mind of the individual with Determination. People with Determination can recall almost every visual detail, and have a significantly higher recall rate of auditory, olfactory, and tactile details. Some memory-altering drugs and treatments are completely ineffective at blocking these memories, others are less effective. I am still searching for a fully effective drug against these memories. All individuals with Determination studied have two Save points, the catalyst (covered in section 2) and a ‘floating’ Save point.  
Unfortunately, studying how a Load is performed is much more difficult, because once the Load is performed any recorded data is inevitably lost. I am experimenting with quantum nanobots linked to others inside a TARDIS in the Time Vortex to collect data on the Load, but here are my findings so far.  
Before a Load is performed, there is a massive spike in the amount of determination present in the person with Determination’s system, far beyond the level of a Save, as well as a spike in heart rate and blood pressure. People with Determination report that Loading takes a second of complete concentration on the Save point. It is possible to prevent a Load by disrupting their concentration, but this does not work indefinitely.  
People with Determination say that Loading feels like pulling themselves through time back to the Save point. Loading is draining mentally, and repeatedly Loading has a cumulative effect, for more information on this see section 6a. Unfortunately, people with Determination have reported the ability to Load after death, and they claim that this form of Loading is instantaneous, though more exhausting and very jarring. Though hard to believe, I was able to confirm this. Even if they are killed instantly and by surprise, a person with Determination can return to a Save point. Furthermore, once they have begun to travel to the beginning of the loop, there is no way to stop them. I haven’t even been able to detect their presence in the Time Vortex, though this may be due to the interference in remote instruments brought about by the Temporal Riptides they create, and the inability to stay within the Riptide.  
A successful Load is marked by a cascade of activity throughout the brain, especially in the memory centers. I haven’t found an upper limit to the time between the Save and the time of Loading, however as the temporal distance becomes greater, the amount and quality of the memories decrease. In other words, it appears that there is an upper limit to the amount of memories that can be recorded in the moments after a Load, although the memories that are successfully transferred are those that are most useful to the person with Determination.  
Time aware individuals can remember the details of events pre-Load, assuming they were present for those events. Others can experience a sense of deja vu as a result of a Load, and even, in some cases, a shift in emotion that corresponds to the events pre-Load. Proximity to the person with Determination (both at the point of Saving and Loading), as well as the level of emotion the events leading up to the Load provoked can both lead to stronger sensations.  
There are several possible explanations for Loading, however the person with Determination sending the body back in time is not one of them. Aside from the disappearance of any injuries sustained pre-load, any instruments placed on the individual to determine what happens during a Load record no data, or are no longer present in the individual if they weren’t present at the time of the Save.  
The most likely mechanism for their abilities is that Loading sends memories back in time. Most people with Determination do not believe this is the case, and are annoyingly insistent on this point. Instead, they believe Loading involves sending their whole mind or soul back in time. They claim that the fact that they feel like the pre-Load events just happened supports this interpretation. I think they just like the idea of traveling through time better then the idea of sending memories back, but as of yet no one has been able to record data to support any claim.  
One final note: before Temporal Riptides were linked to people with Determination, they were thought to have a form of precognition. Now that a link has been established, this explanation no longer makes sense. People with Determination change the future, they do not just observe possible ones, and this affects other time travelers in ways that go beyond the Temporal Riptide.


	4. Determination and Time Travel

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The most Doctor Who related chapter! Also the only one that I thought up this year.

As I’ve mentioned before, people with Determination are responsible for the presence of Temporal Riptides. Do not attempt to travel through these phenomena, you will be unable to land until after you are clear of the time loops they create. Depending on the number of loops they have created, this may damage your TARDIS. None of my research has found a way to negate this effect. Land before or travel around the riptide.  
People with Determination seem to be time aware, they can tell when you are altering time. Even if altering time is not your intent, if you can remember previous loops you will act differently unless you take great pains to repeat your actions, and a person with Determination will see these differences and in most cases treat you as a threat. Proceed with caution. Furthermore, events that take place during their time loops are fixed points in time, in part due to the strain on the time vortex, but also due to the ability of people with Determination to control time. Other events that are important to the individual are also harder to alter. The extent this effect varies based on the individual.  
Due to the one-way nature of their ability, taking a person with Determination out of the timeline and into the time vortex neutralizes their powers, as does bringing them to a point before their earliest active Save point, though the latter does not prevent them from making new Save points.  
While more primitive than a Time Lord’s insight, people with Determination do have some knowledge of the nature of time, they often instinctively seek out key points in space and time in order to shape the world. For example: in one universe, the planet Earth was home to yet another species, one with a highly variable phenotype, and primarily composed of an energy they called ‘magic’. This species, dubbed “monsters”, were sealed under a mountain. This mountain drew in children with an unusually high level of Determination in their bloodstream, though only one such individual created temporal riptides. This allowed a researcher there to discover the chemical. In another universe, where prophecies concerning the end of the world are reliable, a person with Determination may run into, and become an integral part of, four such prophecies in the span of a few months. Finally: when the death of someone is a fixed point in time, even if that someone is close to them, a person with Determination will create far fewer time loops than they would if the point was not fixed before they experienced it.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The second example in the last paragraph is based on Skyrim. But oh man video game protagonists get into everything don't they?
> 
> So I released the first four chapters in one night, but the rest are still in bullet points at the time I posted this so it might take a few weeks to finish the rest.

**Author's Note:**

> This has been sitting in some form on my OneDrive since 2016, but the setup was bad and it was in bullet points, also 16 year old me was not as good at writing. The good news is that all I have to do is reformat it to match the new setup, and I'll upload it as I do! Honestly I was so thrilled when Undertale came out not only because the game is excellent and made me cry but because I was sort of looking for an explanation for how characters could SAVE and LOAD, so I started applying it to other games as well.
> 
> I came up with this while working under the idea that every video game protagonist has determination unless the game they are from either does not allow saving except on exit (ex: roguelikes, Minecraft), or provides another explanation for saving and loading (ex: the Mario franchise and 'lives'). This wasn't just me trying to guess what effects the ability to save and load would have on a person. I wanted to explain video game protagonist behavior, but I never went against Undertale canon. I might put out of character explanations in the notes at the end of the section.


End file.
